Dog days of summer

We're coming into the home stretch, when the long days grow shorter and the heat begins to escape us. I'm jumping the gun a little bit, but after so many hundred degree days over the past month, the weather lately feels down right fall like, with days that are merely warm, not scorching, and nights that are downright cool. Running in the mornings is enjoyable again (even as late as seven am!), so is walking the dogs in the afternoon, and the garden is finally growing.

I say all this on a day that reached a high of 94 degrees.

We have been watching the Olympics, along with much of America, I suppose, and I will jump on the band wagon with them and express my disappointment in NBC's failure to show the events as they happen. Facebook is fraught with spoilers, and my email keeps lighting up with updates from various news sources. There's no hope for magical surprises at this rate. We've been recording the nightly digest and sharing it with Calvin sans ads during dinner or the late afternoon lull. It's better without ads, but he's pretty crushed that they don't show all the medal ceremonies. He's drinking in the swimming. Michael Phelps and Ryan Lochte are names that slip right off our tongues these days, and they've injected him with extra enthusiasm for his own lessons. This may be our first look at something like hero worship.

We dedicate the remaining month of summer to soaking up the warm rays of the sun. To hikes, and bird watching, and fun. And ice cream.

Strange encounters, weekend edition

A cooling breeze coming in through the windows, the warm rays of an early summer sun. I love lazy Saturday mornings when we're slow to rise and a soft sleepiness hangs around for a time before the get-up-and-go takes over. It's the perfect time for a book, or a crossword, or a puzzle, and definitely the perfect time for discovery. Then again, what isn't the perfect time for discovery?

Do you think Iris is wondering what's gotten into us? Crawling around on the ground in a tangle of wires making a variety of frightening sounds and shooting things into the air. She may think we're off our rockers.

She should see us at other times.

Later in the morning we went to the Ann Arbor library book sale. All books were half off their already obscenely low prices so it was hard to resist. We brought home a number of treasures—Calvin picked up a couple of dragon stories and I got a couple of photography books and a beautiful copy of a 1960s Field Guide to the National Parks of East Africa. I love books like this because they have that wonderful book smell, because they are usually very well made, better made than most new books, and because they are primary sources in their own right. History changes as we write about it, and if I want to read about African Wildlife in the 1960s, the best way to do so is in a book from that time. But at the checkout the man helping add up our total felt the need to mention to me that the 1960s guide might not be so accurate anymore. Thanks anyway guy.

After the sale we stopped by our favorite downtown lunch spot, where Calvin devoured not only some truffle pizza, but also his new book on the summer Olympics (another library sale find). This is the first Olympics that he is really aware of, and he's very excited about the swimming and other water sports in particular. We were explaining that they show the most popular sports on a tape delay late at night (something that I, and much of the Twitter world, apparently, find excessively annoying), and that they'd likely be on after bedtime. At that moment the people sitting next to us politely interrupted, asked Calvin about his interest, and then negotiated a later bedtime for him. The Olympics come around so rarely, they argued for him. He was allowed to stay up until 10.

After lunch, shopping at the fair trade shop next door, my quiet perusal of the book shelf was interrupted by an elderly store worker who suggested I read to Calvin a book about "a boy with no toys of his own", unlike the children we're used to, she added. She then proceeded to complain to me about her granddaughter's bursting toy chest and overflowing bedroom. I told her that we try to keep the toys in our house somewhat limited, though "educational products" and books are pretty much coming out our ears, and we chatted briefly about that side of our culture before she up and tried to sell me a toy made by underprivileged children somewhere in the world. I thought she was joking, but she wasn't. I did not enlighten her on the irony of that exchange.

We did go home with our overflowing bags of books, however, and spend the afternoon reading, and snapping circuits, and walking dogs, gardening, discovering, exploring, grilling dinner, and living the lazy summer life. And if you ever want to know about wildlife in 1960s African National Parks, just ask me.

Summer school

There is no real consensus amongst homeschoolers regarding the issue of summer schooling. I know several families in our co-op take a break right along with conventional schoolers, or spend the summer months catching up on reading or revisiting topics they found difficult during the school year. Since Calvin has only just turned six we don't have a set yearly schedule as yet, but we've never considered taking the summers off. I believe I've written about this decision before, mentioning that we see no more reason to take a break from "schooling", or learning rather, than from life itself. But while we still hold to this philosophy, we have made some changes in our daily schedule, and the issue of summer schooling warranted a second glance.

Until very recently we've been dedicated unschoolers, traipsing from one curiosity to another as the day wore on. I found, though, that Calvin responded better to having more direction in his day, so since early May we've been leaning further and further into the classical education world. We spend a little time each day on math, reading, grammar, handwriting, and spelling, throw in history or science to go with it, and spend the rest of the day exploring whatever else we wish. Calvin now has workbooks that he loves for both math and spelling, and I've been combining the other subjects with the history and science in order to tie it all together. We also hit up the library at least once a week, taking home each time a well-rounded collection that includes books of Calvin's choice on science, history, art, poetry, biography, and music. This has been a happy change for us, especially since we aren't actually following a strict curriculum, but are, I believe, combining the best of two great homeschooling methods (those being unschooling and classical).

So how has this change affected our view on schooling in the summer? Actually it hasn't, because we still believe that learning is a way of life, but while the new methodology hasn't altered our view on summer, the summer has changed our methodology somewhat. At this time of year, with buzzing insects, calling birds, and brightly colored and odorific blooms, nature is practically standing on tiptoe and demanding extra attention, and it simply is not to be denied. It seems only natural that in the summer we spend less time on worksheets and more time in the field, less time on history, more time on science. So when we went on vacation last week we didn't take workbooks of any kind, but we did take our wildlife handbooks (and we love the Stan Tekiela series for our state), our hiking shoes, and our innate curiosity. We also took books about Michigan, and Mackinac Island, plus lots of other reading for quiet moments. And I figure something is going right when, on the beach, the boy is making a sand model of Bilbo's Shire.

And when we are worksheeting, we are often doing so from the breezy comfort of our deck while sipping lemonade.

Reading the Mahabharata in the shade

On vacation

It's a silent battle

Who will win the afternoon sunshine?